


Need You to Be Sure

by formercongressman



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: AU, College, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-09-21 10:53:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17042372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/formercongressman/pseuds/formercongressman
Summary: College AU. Raja and Manila get drunk in the library and try to write their finals. It goes as well as you might expect. Also it snows. Title from What I Need by Hayley Kiyoko & Kehlani.





	Need You to Be Sure

Manila rubbed her temples. She was nearing her breaking point. It was 1 AM on a Saturday night, she was trapped in the library with a paper that she just couldn’t finish.

Maybe she would just have to accept turning in a terrible paper. That might also mean accepting a B in the class, which she was not willing to do. But try as she might, she couldn’t string the two arguments together. Yes, _Paris is Burning_ and _Mala Mala_ were similar films, and yes, they both featured trans women and drag queens and did little to establish a distinction between the two groups, and yes that was interesting on a surface level, but what did it matter? What did any of it matter?

Her art final had been done for weeks, a cardboard life-sized heart she had cut and layered to look like it had been 3-D printed. She was so proud of it, a commentary on technology and materials and the ease of artificial reproduction. Why couldn’t every final be like that? This gender studies paper and a plane ride Friday morning was all that was standing between her and her family and Minnesota and properly seasoned food and her good art supplies and –

“God, it reeks in here.” Raja interrupted her train of thought, plopping down in the upholstered chair across from her. She pulled off her beanie and shook out her long black hair, kicking her feet up on the small table next to Manila’s stack of books.

“Did you get it?” Manila asked, happy her friend had returned to distract her.

Raja smirked and pulled a bottle of wine out of her bag. A rosé, thank god. “Do people just stop showering during finals?” she asked. She set the bottle on the table and started rustling through her bag. “I mean it seriously takes five minutes to –"

“Oh my god, hide it!” Manila whispered, looking around worriedly. It was late, technically early in the morning, but the library was still packed.

Her friend rolled her eyes but obliged her, lowering the wine bottle under the table. “Who’s going to catch us, the book cops?” Raja laughed. “Do you have those coffee cups?”

Manila handed her the paper cups she had very stealthily and not at all nervously lifted from the student coffeehouse downstairs. Raja screwed the top off the wine bottle under the table and carefully poured two glasses. Manila hid her smile in her sweatshirt as the bottle glug-glugged and the girl at the end of the long table beside them looked up from her book to glare.

This had been Raja’s idea, but Manila was willing to try anything to get this paper done. Write drunk, edit sober, right? Raja had friends who were 21 and had cars and were generous enough to go on liquor runs for her. Manila was just grateful to get to enjoy the benefits of her friend’s social capital sometimes. She was jealous occasionally, sure, when Raja would recount to her stories of running around campus at midnight with her other friends, of climbing out of science lab windows onto the rooftops, of egging the college president’s house. But tonight, Raja was here with her to bang out their finals papers together instead of going to the laundry room party across campus – and seriously, who throws a party in a laundry room? – and that felt good.

“Thanks for bringing the party to me, Raja,” Manila said, half her face turning up in a smile.

“Anything for you, Nila.” Raja passed her a paper cup that was almost filled to the brim. She lifted it to tap against Raja’s.

“A toast!” Raja proclaimed at full volume, earning her another glare from the girl at the table. “Sorry,” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “A toast, to surviving the first semester of sophomore year without a single trip to the ER!”

“We’re not done yet,” Manila reminded her. She shuddered at the visceral memory of the last day of classes the semester before, when Raja had taken too many shots of flavored vodka at a party, fell of the table she was dancing on, and sliced open her leg. Manila had ridden in the ambulance with her, held her hand in the exam room, and stayed up with her all night.

Raja dutifully knocked on wood. She looked expectantly to Manila to add to the toast.

“Oh! Um… A toast to doing work that matters, to learning how to take better care of ourselves, and to the new sushi they’ve started putting out in the dining hall. And to friendship. Of course.”

Raja smiled so brilliantly and winked at her as they clinked their paper cups and took a sip, and in that moment Manila really _got it_. She understood why Raja was as popular as she was. She got why a few freshmen came up to her every week to ask if Raja was seeing anyone, to whom she would reply that no, Raja doesn’t really do that. She knew why people looked when Raja walked into a room. And, unsettlingly, that lined right up with the voice in the back of her head that she so frequently tried to suppress: _You wondered that too. You look at her too. And what do you think that’s about?_ She stuffed it back down.

It might sound strange, but Raja did have some kind of magic to her. She was somehow both kind and so beautiful she was powerful at the same time. And as much as Manila got to know Raja, as much as she dug, she couldn’t find a single indicator that she cared what anyone made of her. She didn’t feel prepared to know this type of person. She was fascinating. Captivating. And Manila was so grateful to have her around.

Just grateful, she told herself. Nothing more.

“Do your work, bitch,” Raja laughed, shaking Manila from her contemplative haze. She realized she had been staring at her friend for too long. She couldn’t think about that or why it was happening right now, or at least until she finished this paper. She opened her laptop back up, trying to refocus.

After a point Raja refilled both of their cups and made a public display of openly putting the empty bottle into the reading room recycling. Manila tried to act scandalized but just ended up smiling to herself as she tried to write.

0-0-0-0-0

**_Conclusion_ **

_Maybe it really doesn’t matter what it means. Why are we alwayys so desporate to find a meaning? Maybe two people just made to similar films at too diferrent thymes and places. I t doestn dhave to be  that deep!!_

0-0-0-0-0

“Raja?” Manila asked, looking up at her friend who was smirking at her computer screen and slouched in the armchair across from her. About half an hour had passed. The room spun a bit before promptly righting itself. Raja removed her headphones.

“Yeah?”

“Are you getting anything done?”

“Oh, I’ve been watching cooking videos. This man who does all this fermentation is so charming.”

Manila sighed. Okay. Library wine had been a bad idea. Maybe a really bad idea. Not only had she lost the last half hour, but she had lost the rest of the night to being drunk. What little she had been able to write was unusable, probably. She could figure that out in the morning. If she wasn’t hungover. Ugh.

“I’m gonna get some water-” she started, beginning to stand, which ended up being far more challenging than she anticipated. She felt the alcohol throb in her bloodstream before the floor seemed to tilt. She lost her balance and toppled back into her own chair.

Raja shrieked in laughter. She felt it bounce off the lofted ceiling. Every head in the room turned to them.

“It’s fine, everything’s fine,” Manila assured the newfound audience, giggling at herself.

“Oh my god, you’re library wasted!” Raja had lowered her voice, but the girl nearby still tried to make eye contact while almost passive aggressively putting in earbuds.

“ _You’re_ library wasted. I know you’re a lightweight.”

“This is so fucking funny,” Raja snickered.

“Hi, can the two of you maybe keep it down?” A dark-haired person nervously whispered towards them.

“We’re leaving,” Manila responded, shutting her laptop and throwing it into her backpack.

“We are?” Raja asked.

“I can’t stay here, I’m not getting anything done. We might as well have some fun tonight.” If anything, the wine was a nice cushion for her frustration. She couldn’t be too angry about it.

“Well I have work to do too!” Raja protested. Her voice was still loud, but Manila had stopped worrying. Manila shot her friend a knowing glare. “ _Fine_. Oh, let’s go see if that laundry party is still happening!”

“Yes, that’s a brilliant plan.” _Dancing_ , that was what Manila needed. What they both needed, probably.

Raja stood to pack her bag, and Manila noticed that she kept her arms out to stabilize herself. “Oh god, if I don’t have a cigarette I’m not going to make it home. How strong was that?” Raja asked.

Manila wasn’t quite sure. Strong enough to make her wobble as she walked. Strong enough that she smiled a stupidly wild smile when Raja linked arms with her as they hopped down the staircase. Strong enough that she felt warm and happy and good, a welcome reprieve from all of the stress swirling around her during finals.

They sat next to each other on the wrought iron bench outside of the library. She shielded Raja’s lighter from the wind while she lit her cigarette, and then Raja did the same for her. It had been a bit warmer than the average December overall, but now at about 2 AM the cold was starting to bite. Manila exhaled a cloud of smoke, doubled in size with the visible vapor from her breath. She pulled her jacket tighter around her. A small tobacco buzz grew in her chest, and she felt a little more grounded than she had before.

For a minute they smoked in silence with the dry, cold sounds of winter wrapped around them. A car rumbled by on the main stretch of road. Someone hollered, probably from the party, across campus. The few leaves still clinging to the trees rustled with a small breeze.

“I admire you,” Raja said after a few beats. Her eyes were focused on something in the distance.

Manila could feel her heartbeat in the base of her throat.

“What did you say?” Maybe she was a bit more grounded, but she was still drunk. That didn’t make sense.

“I admire you. Your work ethic. You really _care_ about things, Manila. Even things that you don’t really need to care about. You do things so deliberately. I admire that.”

 _Oh._ Right. Of course. “Thanks,” she said in a small voice.

“I’m trying to be more like that, I think.”

“How so?”

“It’s hard to say, I think. So much has happened to me – is happening to me – here at this school but I feel like I might be missing it. Like I’m not engaged enough. Like I’m going to look back next year or even next month and realize all of the things that passed me by and I wasn’t experiencing something important fully enough.”

“Oh, Raja, no, I don’t think-” Manila knew that Raja tended to ramble when she was drunk, and that she could pour out her entire life in a single run on sentence. Sometimes Manila let her, but this wasn’t the night.

“Sorry, I just keep getting worked up about it.”

Silence again. Manila put her cigarette out in the ashtray. Raja finished hers after a few more drags and set it aside. Manila tapped the toe of her foot on the sidewalk. She wanted to be reassuring of everything she was feeling, but also wanted to give her room to think. Her drunk head and her drunk heart wanted two different things, and as a result nothing was coming out.

“Can I try something?” Raja asked finally.

“Sure, of course,” Manila answered automatically.

Raja turned to face Manila more fully. She tucked a piece of her own black hair behind her ear before leaning in so close their noses almost touched. Manila felt long fingers wrap around the back of her neck to lace gently in her hair. They each took a breath in the shared air. Raja paused hesitantly, an intense question in her eyes, _are you sure?_ And Manila tried to answer with her eyes the only cohesive thought she could conjure right now:  she didn’t like to know how a story began without knowing how it ended.

Very slowly, Raja pressed her lips to Manila’s. It was chaste, closed-mouthed, but Manila felt a rush go through her body. She felt her lips soften as Raja’s glided over hers, chapstick-on-chapstick. But otherwise she was frozen, unable to move, unable to fully kiss back. Her heart was in her stomach and she suddenly felt immediately sober and unconvinced this was actually happening.

Raja pulled back, a look of concern now in her eyes. Manila worried perhaps she might be regretting it and her stomach flipped over.

“You’re shaking,” Raja noted, worry in her voice. Manila crinkled her brow. She hadn’t noticed.

“It’s cold,” she responded, the only thing she could think of.

“No, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—” Raja started to look away from her, and Manila glimpsed a future in which things were off between them, where they couldn’t talk about this because it was weird, where they stopped being best friends. She didn’t want that.

Manila cut her off with a kiss. A definitive kiss, one that felt unsettlingly right and natural. It took a moment but they both recovered from the shock. Raja’s hand was back in her hair, tighter now, pulling Manila in.

She set her hand on Raja’s hip and _oh wow kissing on a bench was weird_ , but she moved as close as she could. She tasted cigarettes, green tea, and ginger. Raja’s teeth brushed lightly against her lower lip, the most gentle ghost of a bite, and Manila could feel herself inhale sharply as a shudder rocked her shoulders. _Damn_.

She pulled back to giggle when their teeth clacked against each other, but then saw the look of worry in Raja’s eyes. “Wait, wait really-” Raja said, her hands coming up over her mouth.

“Sorry, I’m so sorry.” Manila made space between them. She felt dizzy. She wasn’t quite sure where the rush of adrenaline was coming from, but she felt that in her fingertips.

“No it’s not that, it’s just…” Raja took a deep breath and wrapped her arms tightly around her chest. There was a long pause as she stared at the ground. “Can I say something? I need to say something.”

Manila didn’t stop her.

“I’m trying to figure out if I like you. I mean, of course I like you, you’re one of my closest friends and I value that friendship so deeply, but I feel like you know me so much better than any of my other friends and it’s gotten me thinking that this might be something more. And I don’t think I’ve really felt that way about a friend before so this is absolutely terrifying and I’m not sure it’s actually what I’m feeling, or maybe I’m just hoping it isn’t, I don’t know _. I don’t know_. I think I just wanted you to know that I’m twenty times more confused after that but I don’t think I’ve felt like this-”

“Raja.” Manila grabbed her hand out of the air where she had begun gesticulating wildly. She folded it into her own.

“Sorry. I just wanted you to know.”

“No, I just don’t want you to say anything that you’re going to regret tomorrow.”

Raja paused for a moment. “I wanted to say this. For a while. I didn’t know how. I’m sorry.”

Manila watched Raja sink back in to the contemplative, distant state she had been in before. Manila had hurt her, cutting her off, not thinking or listening enough. But her insides felt like a tangled mess she couldn’t sort through. This was her best friend, her support system, for whom she cared so deeply. But Manila had never thought about it like _this_ before.

_You like her, bitch. You have feelings._

That voice from earlier that she stuffed down was back. And it might be right.

Manila got off the bench and crouched down on the ground in front of Raja, working her way into her line of vision. “Hey. _I’m_ sorry. Everything you’re feeling… it makes sense. I’m confused too. I’m nervous to put words on what I’m feeling but I know I really like kissing you. I’d like to do more of it. So… maybe we can figure it out together?”

Raja exhaled and nodded, her eyes drifting shut in relief.  “Yes, I’d really like that. But… can we figure it out tomorrow? I’m so dizzy and I don’t know if I can process right now.”

“Of course.” Manila smiled up at her, and Raja finally smiled back. They laced their fingers together and Manila squeezed tightly.

Raja’s face brightened. “Hey! Look! I think it’s snowing!” She stood up and moved towards the light post, arms extended, watching snowflakes land on her outstretched hands. The flakes were coming down in surprisingly large clumps, and Raja had a look of pure wonder on her face as they swirled around her.

“Oh my god,” Manila breathed, getting up to join her. The snow fell so lightly and totally silently. They hadn’t had a snow storm all year and while this wasn’t quite at storm levels, it was still enchanting.

Raja started catching snowflakes on her tongue, and soon began darting back and forth trying to catch the biggest ones. Manila laughed and eventually joined her, cackling when Raja nearly dove to the ground to catch one and almost falling down herself when they ran into each other.

Eventually they decided it was time to go and they started walking home across campus hand in hand. Manila tried not to think too much about what it meant, if anything. Her legs were still unsteady – and whether this was from the adrenaline or the alcohol she couldn’t be sure – and she would have fallen on her ass slipping on the slick paths unless Raja had been there to steady her. There was no sound coming from the building where the laundry room party was supposed to be happening. Either it had been a bust or the party cops had broken it up. Probably for the best.

“Do you think it’ll stick?” Manila asked as they neared her dorm. She watched the snow gathering on the academic green, which was already dusted white.

“I don’t know. I think we’ll just have to wait and see in the morning. I hope it does.” Raja smiled at her. “You promise we’ll talk tomorrow?”

“Yes, I promise. Early. We can get breakfast together,” Manila answered.

The bell in the old clocktower in the center of campus rang out three chimes, reminding them of the early hour.

“Lunch,” they both said at the same time, followed by a brief fit of laughter.

“I’m gonna be so fucking nervous sober, I hope you’re ready for that.”

“I will be too.”

“Great, good. It’s a plan.”

They paused, neither sure what was supposed to happen next. They were in front of Manila’s dorm and on a normal night they would have parted ways easily, but their hands were still interlaced.

“Goodnight Manila,” Raja offered finally.

“Goodnight Raja.”

Raja leaned in and pressed a quick peck to Manila’s lips, and she couldn’t hide her smile.

Manila went inside, dusting the snow off her hair and gently touching her lips where the feeling of Raja’s kiss lingered. The weight of her backpack reminded her of her unfinished paper, but it could stand to wait. She watched as Raja headed towards her building, eventually disappearing into the now rapidly falling snow.

She hoped it stuck too.


End file.
